Alaska Native Collections – Sharing Knowledge

Cavilqaat. Tau taumeng wii atutullrat tangtullruamki qaygimi uitatullruama arnaungerma tang wii qanerrcigatellruunga. (They carved with it. I used to see them use it when they stayed in the men’s house, even though I was a girl. I was a mischievous girl.)

—Neva Rivers, 2002

The curved, or “crooked,” knife is an old tool still used by contemporary carvers. The knives were used for shaping masks, boxes, trays, tubs, harpoon shafts, bows, arrows, boat frames, and many other items. With its curved edge, a mellgar can sculpt grooves and concave interiors as well as flat or convex surfaces, and the sharp tip lends itself to the carving of fine details. The blade is scrap metal or a piece of steel knife or file. It is lashed to a handle made of wood, bone, or antler.

(The one used for splitting [the pointed end of the handle]. If I stick it in the wood, then let it go, and if it starts to go crookedly, you steer it with this one [the handle]. Then you use this side [curved knife blade] to make it thinner. This is the curved knife.)

Virginia Minock: He uses this [pointed] end to split the wood, a certain kind of wood, but he has to drive it, to make sure it doesn’t [wiggle].

(We make ones [handles] that look like this made from the tip of the rib. I had one for patching kayaks like this. They used to call them ilaarrtursuun [tool used for patching]).

Neva Rivers:Ataam elliqatamegteki uumeng cal’ aturluteng stitch-at imkut avaggun piluku uumeng cal’ aturluteng antaqluki [when they are going to put it (the kayak cover) on again, they would use this and do the stitching using this and also to take it (stitching) out.] Use this one and go through the same stitch [hole]. This is very useful one. And the ones that I know of, my papa’s, it’s shaped up like that.

Joan Hamilton: More round.

Neva Rivers: Rounded, yes. And he used it unarcimeng piaqami [when working on straight-grained wood]. Wedge-ameng pirraarluku kaugtuqarraarluku nutaan-llu taumeng piluku unarcineng piaqami [after using the wedge and after hitting it, then do it with that one when he’s working on straight-grained wood]. He used that [handle end] for his thumb and forefinger to be protect it, because it [the fingers] will lead this one [the handle] not to go by other way [crooked], but this one will protect it.

Joan Hamilton: Guide it.

Neva Rivers: Guide it. This way, this [the split] will be [straight], maliggluku qupiaqan [follow it when he is slicing it].

(I used to use those. Take it here first, the straight grained wood after splitting it, then use a wedge and make it smaller. Then after they are made smaller, if he is able to use this [the handle], he uses it to split wood.)

Uses

Neva Rivers:Uumun aturluteng [using that (the curved blade)] they made little kindlings [wood shavings], made sure that they make it real small. And when their [pile of shavings] was big enough, qipluku [twist it], imgulluku [wrap it up]. And they use it for the fire-bath [respirator].

(They carved with it. I used to see them use it when they used to stay in the men’s house even though I was a girl, I was a mischievous girl.)

Joan Hamilton:Tangerrsugnarqellruut.

(It was good to watch.)

John Phillip, Sr.:Iqmiuciquni tua-i wani-w’ una ilua aturciquq.

(If he was making a tobacco container, he would use it [the curved blade] for [scooping out] inside.)

Neva Rivers: You have to use the thumb in here [on the concave surface of the curved blade], mikcuarauluku piukunegteggu [if they want to make a small one (hollow)], because I’ve seen my grandfather. My papa and my grandmother tell story about this kind [of tool].

Joan Hamilton: You can guide the depth with your thumb and finger. And that way you can guide how deeply you’re carving.

(They use these very, very sharp. If it is dull the carving will not be good. They always sharpen it.)

Neva Rivers: And I’ve seen my papa, he tanned that big maklak [bearded seal (hide)] to make a qayaq [kayak (cover)]. He would use this kind [of knife] and go this way all the way to mangarrluku [bevel it].(4)

(When I became able, I started trying to make things. Watch. And they would talk to me like this, “Be an observant person. Observe those who are working.” After I started making fish traps, I used this kind.)

(I don’t know my age. Maybe twelve, it seems to be around twelve. We didn’t keep track of age when we began to work, and it wasn’t important. When a person has learned to work, he began to work back then.)

Joan Hamilton: What they did was at first they watched, and then once they think they’ve learned enough, if they have somebody teaching them, then they’ll try on little things, hone their skills. They didn’t pay attention to age, instead they paid attention to skills development.

(They summon us to do things by watching what we are able to do. In our tradition there is a saying: “If a person is able to do things, let him start.” And that is how it begins, that is how they would talk to us.)

Neva Rivers:Piugngarillra [when he is able]. Like they say they’re old enough, wangkuta-llu piugnariluki [we say they are able to] in our own language.

Joan Hamilton: They never told you that you couldn’t learn anything, you couldn’t do anything.

It’s just not time yet. And you know sometime in the future it’ll be time. (Laughter.)

[From discussions with Joan Hamilton (Yupiit Piciryarait Cultural Center and Museum), Virginia Minock, John Phillip, Sr. and Neva Rivers at the National Museum of Natural History and National Museum of the American Indian, 4/22/2002-4/26/2002. Also participating: Aron L. Crowell, William Fitzhugh, and Stephen Loring (NMNH), Suzi Jones (Anchorage Museum), and Ann Fienup-Riordan.]

1. A mellgar is a “knife with a curved blade used for carving” (Jacobson 1984).

2. Mellgaq is the word for mellgar “curved knife” in the Hooper Bay-Chevak dialect of Yupik.

The curved or “crooked” knife is a traditional tool that contemporary wood carvers all across Alaska still use. Men employed them in the past to fashion masks, boxes, trays, tubs, harpoon shafts, bows, arrows, boat frames, and many other items.(1)

Because of its curved edge, the crooked knife can sculpt grooves and concave interiors as well as flat or convex surfaces, while the sharp tip lends itself to carving fine details. The blade—made from scrap metal or a piece of steel knife or file—is bent to form a curve and fastened onto a wood, bone or antler handle with a lashing of root, sinew or sealskin.(2)

Alaska Natives had crooked knives with metal blades from before the time of direct contact with Western explorers and traders. Captain James Cook, who met a group of Yup’ik kayakers in Kuskokwim Bay in 1778, wrote that: “They appeared to be wholly unacquainted with people like us, they knew not the use of Tobacco, nor was anything foreign seen about them, except a knife may be looked upon as such.

This indeed was only a piece of common iron fitted into a wooden handle, so as to answer the purpose of a knife; they however knew the value and use of this instrument so well that it seemed to be the only thing wished for.”(3) Zagoskin reported that the earliest Russian fur traders in Norton Sound found that the people there already possessed knives and other metal goods, probably obtained through trade from Siberia.(4) Before metal was available, carvers used sharpened beaver or porcupine incisor teeth with wooden handles.(5)